TRENTON SAVING FUND SOCIETY BUILDING

“The Trenton Saving Fund Society was incorporated in 1844 and began business on July 20, 1847, in an office in the original Trenton City Hall. After moving several times, the managers decided to build a new banking house at the current location on East State Street, which was completed in April 1901. The white granite, steel structure building, designed by New York architects Moweray and Affinger in the Beaux Arts style, is one of Trenton’s most beautiful buildings. An equally distinguished classical vocabulary was used on the building’s interior, intended to give all who did business there a sense of pride and security. The central banking room’s stained glass ceiling was covered over with acoustic tiles as part of an ill-advised modernization.” – The Trenton Historical Society

“Completed 1901, the Trenton Saving Fund Society building is an imposing edifice of Beaux Arts design intended to convey enduring strength and fiscal stability. White Hallowell granite—the same stone used 10 years earlier in the Battle Monument—faces the exterior of the steel-framed building. The well-proportioned temple front features a broken dentilated pediment with a decorative tympanum of floral swags and a cartouche. The massive Ionic pilasters frame a high arched vestibule that leads to the main banking floor.

The metal grill at the entry, adorned with fanciful characters and spread eagles and surmounted by a soaring eagle clutching a lantern in its beak, was added in the 1920s, according to historic photographs.

Through the wide archway, customers entered a banking room that must have inspired awe. Marble banking counters were embellished with mahogany woodwork, bronze screens and beveled glass insets. The rich red African Numidian marble floor was inset with mosaic tiles. Corinthian pilasters and paneled walls soared 40 feet to a deeply coffered ceiling sumptuously decorated with gilded raised panels. In the center of the ceiling a large circular stained glass window sheds a soft light into every corner of the room.” – Glenn R. Modica , Trenton Downtowner